Bicycle infrastructure improvements are the preferred method for encouraging bicycling

Many respondents indicated they would not use bicycle infrastructure improvements

#4 Regulatory, enforcement, and pricing strategies will be controversial

Respondents were not supportive of increased regulation and enforcement

Respondents supported changes to loading zone restrictions

Respondents supported the development of another parking garage, though with varying support for time frames

Metered parking strategies are not supported; many respondents said it would deter them from visiting downtown

Discussion: John Williams stated he wasn’t surprised by the responses. They seemed somewhat unrealistic in several cases. Such as, having visitors pay for the shuttle, educating employers to get their employees to not drive to work etc. Rich said he was interested in the responses to the paid parking; specifically that paid parking would deter some people from actually visiting downtown.

Charter services can be used to help offset costs if trolleys are purchased

Discussion: Question was raised regarding how this might interfere with RVTD’s bus route and it was stressed that it isn’t intended to have any effect on RVTD; hopefully it would complement RVTD and provide another mode of transportation. The committee also raised concern regarding the trolley being able to handle, at times, approximately 2,000 attendees coming out of the Shakespeare shows around 11:00 pm. It was pointed out the trolley doesn’t have to be designed to handle shuttling 2,000 people at a time. Many of the festival goers walk to their hotel/bed & breakfast. It is designed to provide another mode of transportation. There was some concern with the capital cost of the trolleys which the Transportation System Plan (TSP) estimated at close to three quarters of a million dollars each. Emphasis was given that the trolleys could be designed however they see fit. The Committee questioned whether a subcommittee might be necessary to vet the trolley details. A comment was made that this trolley idea keeps coming up and then it ends up fizzling out for a variety of reasons; Ashland doesn’t seem to really support mass transit. If the City moves forward with the feasibility study there is hope that some research would be done to see why that is & why RVTD hasn’t been very successful even when it was free. Also, what evidence is there that there is a tangible return on the investment to purchase and operate a trolley system. CPW remarked the feasibility study would get to that level. Chair Young pointed out the intent behind this trolley wasn’t to be cute and fun. He said the committee hasn’t even looked at the public/private partnerships which he had hoped they would. There may be hotels interested in participating in a partnership in lieu of running their own shuttles. Joe stated he would ride the trolley everyday if it were an option. Members of the committee are open to the idea of having an alternative mode of transportation but are concerned with cost, ridership etc. Michael added that during the Transportation System Plan (TSP) process there were a number of them that felt that what Ashland needed its own separate circulation system and use the bigger bus system to get people to the outlying cities. The committee would like to see data on how many fewer cars would be parking downtown if the trolley was implemented. CPW said they hadn’t explored the impacts, but they can. The committee questioned what CPW thought about doing a pilot study in order to measure the success. CPW stated the challenge of doing a pilot study for something like this is the capital cost involved. Lee pointed out that when we looked for comparatives, we didn’t find any. He said it doesn’t mean there aren’t any out there but if nobody our size can afford one of these then we are already started up a hill. He also pointed out that when the City was spending a few hundred thousand dollars a year subsidizing RVTD it didn’t make the parking problems go away. He said if you want to do a feasibility study that is great but he doesn’t think it is going to be financially viable here with all of the conditions Ashland has. Rich Kaplan hopes that nobody will think the can is being kicked down the street. It is more about trying the low hanging fruit first (incremental changes) and then move on to the other options, if the low hanging fruit isn’t sufficient. Craig is supportive of what the committee has been talking about but he would like to see employee parking incorporated; such as creating districts, where employees pay a monthly fee for parking.

Lisa/Marie direct CPW to move forward with strategies related to informational resources, wayfinding and regulation (this also includes creating benchmarks for measuring success) and defer the trolley and pricing (paid parking).

Michael stated he voted no because he is a strong proponent of paid parking.

CPW explained they will come back in September to discuss informational resources and hopefully wayfinding in October. Lee added in order for the upcoming biennial budget to include any budget implications associated with these changes they would need to be included when the budget discussions take place around March, 2015. CPW added that by the end of the year they are hoping to have the finished report to present to the committee by November/December with the hope that it could be presented to the Council January/February, in time for the budget process.